Seasonal influenza vaccine hesitancy profiles and determinants among Chinese children’s guardians and the elderly

ABSTRACT

Objectives

Seasonal influenza vaccine coverage remains low in China due to possible influenza vaccine hesitancy (IVH) and practical issues. We sought to investigate IVH and its determinants among children’s guardians and the elderly for a better understanding of the situation and for future intervention.

Methods

We performed two cross-sectional studies to identify the profiles and determinants of IVH using stratified cluster random sampling in an eastern China province in 2019.

Results

Of the 1564 guardians and 522 elders, 43.2% (95%CI: 40.4–46.0%) of guardians and 33.5% of elders (95%CI: 29.5–37.6%) had IVH. ‘From rural area’ (odds ratio: 1.36), ‘don’t know government recommendation for flu vaccination’ (1.39), ‘don’t know flu vaccine is vaccinated annually’ (1.93), and ‘family members (0.22), friends and neighbors had positive attitude toward flu vaccine’ (0.58) were related factors of the guardians’ IVH. ‘Aged 70–79 years’ (0.46), ‘had flu before’ (0.35) and ‘once had been vaccinated’ (0.42) were related to the elderly’s IVH.

Conclusion

Poor awareness of influenza and vaccination, relatives’ negative/positive attitude, lack of government recommendations, anxiety about vaccine quality, and practical issues such as short supply are related to IVH in China. Precision education aimed at hesitancy in wider groups is anticipated to increase vaccine confidence and coverage in influenza-vulnerable groups.

KEYWORDS:

• Vaccine hesitancy
• influenza
• scale
• awareness
• vaccine demand
• characteristics
• determinants

Acknowledgments

The authors acknowledge help from all the community health service centers in Hangzhou, Ningbo, Huzhou, Jiaxing, Jinhua, Quzhou, Taizhou, and Lishui in the coordination in the field survey.

Declaration of interest

The authors have no relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript. This includes employment, consultancies, honoraria, stock ownership or options, expert testimony, grants or patents received or pending, or royalties.

Reviewer disclosures

Peer reviewers on this manuscript have no relevant financial or other relationships to disclose.

Author Contributions

WZ and FCX designed the study. WZ wrote the manuscript. WZ, SX, YYY and ZSY recruited the participants and collected the data. WZ did the statistical analyses. FCX contributed to review and revision. All authors have seen and approved the final version of the manuscript.

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed here.

Additional information

Funding

This paper was not funded.